Millennium Square is a modern city square in

Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, situated south of Leeds and east of Manchester. The city is the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its so ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. It was created as part of the Heart of the City project that began in 1998 and has become a central feature in Sheffield's redeveloped city centre. It contains fountains in the shape of steel spheres, recalling Sheffield's past as a centre of the steel making industry, whilst linking with the fountains of the Peace Gardens, as well as Sheaf Square, Hallam Square and Barkers Pool. The square forms part of the 'Gold Route', designed by Sheffield City Council to guide visitors through the city centre from Sheffield Station to Devonshire Green. Part of the space now part of the square was previously occupied by the Town Hall Extension. This building, constructed in the 1970s, was demolished in the early 2000s to make way for the wave of new developments in the Heart of the City project. The Square, which is in fact triangular, was designed by Architects Allies and Morrison and is surrounded by new developments on three sides and the redeveloped Peace Gardens on the remaining side. The surface of the square is made up of a suspended

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of aggregate bound together with a fluid cement that cures to a solid over time. It is the second-most-used substance (after water), the most–widely used building material, and the most-manufactur ...

slab covered with

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

and

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

paving. The surface is covered with hundreds of

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (corresp ...

lights which are used to illuminate both square itself and the steel water features throughout it. The square is intended to form a link between the Winter and Peace Gardens and also the St Paul's Place development, which is home to Sheffield's tallest building. The square is surrounded in all sides by new or renovated structures, with the Peace Gardens and Town Hall on one side and a multitude of new buildings on the three remaining sides.

Water features

The steel balls in the square, of which are there are nine, are water features that were subject of a design competition held in 2003. The winner, artist Colin Rose, designed the feature in order to symbolise the

steel Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon that demonstrates improved mechanical properties compared to the pure form of iron. Due to steel's high Young's modulus, elastic modulus, Yield (engineering), yield strength, Fracture, fracture strength a ...

, craftsmanship,

stonework Stonemasonry or stonecraft is the creation of buildings, structures, and sculpture using rock (geology), stone as the primary material. Stonemasonry is the craft of shaping and arranging stones, often together with Mortar (masonry), mortar ...

and

water Water is an inorganic compound with the chemical formula . It is a transparent, tasteless, odorless, and Color of water, nearly colorless chemical substance. It is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known liv ...

which are symbolic of Sheffield's industrial heritage. The Piece is called ‘Rain’ and is designed to evoke the falling of rain drops upon the ground, with the small pools at the base of each steel ball creating the ripple effect.

References

Squares in Sheffield Buildings and structures celebrating the third millennium {{SouthYorkshire-geo-stub